In a previous article we introduced the first uCHobby designed kit. The SBBPWR1 is a handy power supply module which plugs directly into a solderless breadboard. The previous article detailed the the overall design process for this kit. The SBBPWR1 has been received well and we got several good suggestions for improvements.
This article describes […]

In this article Steven Moughan shows us how to setup for PIC microcontroller development on Linux. Steve writes the following…
PICs are great, they really are… they have great features, decent instruction sets,
there’s lots to choose from, their manufacturer released a great IDE (MPlab) what could go wrong? Unfortunately the PIC is somewhat lacking when […]

In this short article Frank provides example code to use the Nintendo Wii Nunchuck as a mouse. In this previous article we looked at the Nunchuck and an adaptor board I purchased from Todbot. I also mentioned making a mouse device using the Nunchuck using ideas from Bernard’s Accelerometer Based Mouse article. Frank has done […]

I just got a pile of goodies from Wright Hobbies. I plan on using this stuff in upcoming projects and would welcome any suggestions.  Eddy Wright contacted me about getting a reciprocal link on uCHobby so I checked out his site. Wright Hobbies focuses on robotics and offers a nice starter kit for microcontroller […]

Bernard introduces us to the dsPIC microcontroller. He shows us his Arduino like project board for a dsPIC and gives advice on software development tools.
This article was submitted by Bernard Klinc as part of the “Hobby parts for articles” program. Bernard received a graphic LCD module for this great article. You may remember Bernard […]

A uCHobby reader informed us of a design contest Renesas is running with prizes of $15,000 in cash. Renesas provides a free $80 evaluation board to work with as part of the contest so no one actually looses. Thanks to Daniel Johnson for passing the news.
The theme of the contest is applications for their new […]

An adjustable current sink is useful for testing power supplies and figuring out how much current an LED might need. I built up this circuit to test a new power supply I was working on and revived it after seeing a couple of related post at Keith’s Electronics Blog. He wants to build a handy […]

In this article I show my process for doing a pre-order fit check on a new PCB design being done in Kicad. This process is easy to do and well worth the effort. You only need a printer and the parts you plan to use on the board.
There have been several recent articles on the […]

In this article Randall Bohn converts the Liberlab microcontroller project software so that the Arduino platform can take advantage of the great Liberlab software and experiment platform. We mentioned Liberlab here at uChobby in a recent article.
Liberlab is an excellent lab tool for learning about analog and digital control. With a programmed microcontroller and the […]

KICAD is free and open source engineering design software, including schematic capture and PCB layout tools. There is even a plug-in that does 3D modeling of your PCB. Versions for Windows, Linux, and Mac OSX are available From what I can tell after playing with it a short time, it is complete and well done. […]